We're Not Talking About Santa and His Reindeer!
Getting Your Home Prepped For Special Holiday Visitors
Last week, we talked about how to reduce the stress of holiday demands & to make your holiday season more enjoyable. Certainly, one aspect of the holidays is visitors to your home. It’s great when you get to have time to dedicate to friends and family, but the holidays occasionally bring so much demand on your schedule that it can not only eat up your time but make the time less enjoyable-even potentially causing that friction that we sometimes dread happening.
With Christmas only a few weeks away & the greater holiday season already in full swing, what can you do to prep your home in advance of the arrival of your house guests & make your holidays a little more sane?
“Cleaning your home before guests arrive is a must; however, keeping the atmosphere around the house as close to normal as possible will help put guests at ease”, recommends Zillow.com. “Newspapers on the coffee table and a casual playlist in the background set the stage for relaxation”.
What this means for you is a lighter load. Only light cleaning & organization-tidy up the house, make it clean and comfortable, not a model home.
Zillow also recommends making a little downtime in your guest’s schedule-plan time to not plan anything. “Having a few tentative outings or other visitors on the agenda can be helpful, but avoid the urge to fill every last minute. Most guests will really appreciate some blocks of unstructured time to relax, chat, read, nap or even venture out on their own.”
It’s also a great idea to make a mini-toiletries and essentials bag-this will ensure they have what they need when they get here & you won’t have to spend time pulling supplies together on the fly. A quick trip to your local box store’s travel toiletries section affordably provides travel size deodorant, toothpaste and soap.
To make them feel really at home, let them participate in your daily activities and processes-chipping in on shopping, meal planning, making dinner or doing the dishes most-meals, showing them the laundry room so they can handle their own laundry has the dual effect of making them feel at home in participation and reducing the amount of work you have to undertake.
The truth of hosting during the holidays, or at any time of the year, is hospitality is key, but your home is not a hotel. Making your guests feel comfortable is going to greatly increase the happiness of your guests, but even by reducing the amount of work you think you should you do, you can actually create opportunities for great holiday experiences & memories for your guests.
After all, that’s what the holidays are all about!